1. According to "Mark," American women care too much about sex. So much so that he won't have sex with them. Filipinas don't care about sex. If Filipinas don't care about sex, then they're zombies in bed. As if Filipinas enjoyed sex less than women in other countries! That's pretty darn offensive. And gross.

2. If you're in your mid-forties and still a virgin, the...re's probably a good reason for that.

3. "Mark" is definitely not taking into account factors such as poverty and race-induced status, like the desire to take whatever you can get.

4. Hold on a sec: you say the women you've been with only wanted sex so you remained a virgin, but you go to the Philippines for sex anyway? I'm gonna take a guess and say those women from your past weren't Filipinas.

5. You use women to fill an emotional gap, while women use you to get out of the country. Either way, that's kinda screwed up.

6. Two words: Sexual Colonialism.

7. "I know that there are many Filipino women who would like very much to meet a nice American man and take care of him." -- while we're at it, let's put down Filipino men, too! "What you need is an AMERICAN."

8. While there are definitely differences that should be explored in any multicultural relationship, doing so from a position of power and privilege over the other is definitely not the way to go.

9. This will be said more than once: "WOMAN! Stay in the kitchen and make me some of dat dere lumpia!"

10. "Many of the women I met when I was there can't understand why American people are so fixated with having sex. There's no divorce over there, and the biggest reason for that is because they value positive personal qualities like honesty, loyalty and sincerity in one's actions over how outgoing and charming a person is." -- Let's completely forget the number of people who won't leave due to family or societal pressures, even if they're the victims of theft, dishonesty, infidelity, and domestic abuse.

To say that I'm disappointed in what's traditionally Chicago's major progressive paper would be an understatement. I'm planning on writing a letter to the Sun-Times and Cheryl Levin soon along these lines:

"Dear Sun-Times,

Please do not promote any more outdated ideas about: submissive Asian women, encouraging people to take advantage of different cultures for sexual pleasure, and/or to make up for their poor social development and self-esteem through exotic gratification.

Sincerely,The 21st Century"

-----EDIT:

Before I published this post, I wrote an earlier draft on facebook. Travis had this to say about Levin's column:

"Why would a serious journalist, ironically or otherwise, post this as a valid option? Also: I love this man's presupposition that his inability to have a long-term relationship with an American woman was because they're such whores and they can't appreciate how special he is. I doubt that's the issue. She should have pseudonymed him Dick instead of Mark."

I responded:

"^Good point about "Dick." :)

Clearly the guy doesn't want to address the real issues as to why he's been celibate for this long. And celibacy isn't necessarily a bad thing either, and yet he chooses (that's right, chooses) to use "advice" as a way of framing his latent needs of exoticism and his desire to feel superior to someone (in this case, all Filipino men as a whole)."